Movement intelligence using satellite imagery

ABSTRACT

A system for incorporating geographical data into a map-related system, adding objects being tracked while moving within a specific geographic area and automatically analyzing their movement characteristics; wherein the tracking is done by visual means from a sky-borne platform.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 15/241,034, titled “MOVEMENT INTELLIGENCE USING SATELLITEIMAGERY” and filed on Aug. 18, 2016, which claims the benefit of, andpriority to, U.S. provisional patent application Ser. No. 62/206,827,titled “MOVEMENT INTELLIGENCE USING SATELLITE IMAGERY” and filed on Aug.18, 2015, the entire specification of each of which is incorporatedherein by reference in its entirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Field of the Invention

The disclosure relates to the field of social media, and moreparticularly to the field of detection and tracking of moving objects onthe earth's surface using satellite imagery.

Discussion of the State of the Art

Information on human settlements is crucial for a wide range ofapplications including emergency response, disaster risk reduction,population estimation/analysis, and urban/regional planning.Urbanization pressure generates environmental impacts, indicatespopulation growth, and relates to risk and disaster vulnerability. Forinstance, the global population passed the mark of 7.0 billion in 2011with more than half of the population living in urban areas. Between2011 and 2050, the urban population is expected to increase by about 2.7billion, passing from 3.6 billion in 2011 to 6.3 billion in 2050. Thepopulation growth in urban areas is projected to be concentrated in thecities and towns of the less developed countries and continents. Asia,in particular, is projected to see its urban population increase by 1.4billion, Africa by 0.9 billion, and Latin America and the Caribbean by0.2 billion.

Population growth is therefore becoming largely an urban phenomenonconcentrated in the developing world resulting in major challenges tomanage the urban development in a sustainable manner. A central issue inthis respect is the availability of up-to-date information on the extentand quality of the urban settlement (e.g., the urban “build-up” or“built-up”) which is largely unavailable in developing countries. Forinstance, cities are often growing at a pace that cannot be fullycontrolled by the local or regional mapping agencies. As demographicpressure increases exponentially at a global level, the ability tomonitor, quantify and characterize urbanization processes around theworld is becoming paramount. The information about the quality of urbandevelopment can provide precious input for understanding thevulnerability of the population living on our planet.

While satellite imagery could provide information about the world-widebuilt-up environment, there are few global data sets available thatcould be used to map the human settlements. Examples include thenight-time lights of the world based on the Defense MeteorologicalSatellite Program-Operational Linescan System (DMSP-OLS) sensor,Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) based landuse/land cover classifications, and global population data sets likeLANDSCAN™ or the gridded population of the world (GPW). While theaforementioned data sets are useful for global analysis, the data setshave the tendency to underrepresent small, scattered rural settlementsdue to the low spatial resolution of the data sets between, forinstance, 500 and 2,000 m. Furthermore, the data sets represent singlesnap-shots in time that do not allow for regular monitoring. Stillfurther, if the data sets are updated (e.g., the LANDSCAN™ data set),they are not directly comparable due to changing input sources.

Image analysis has been an important field of technology at least sincethe period of World War 2, when extensive use of image analysis,photogrammetry, and related technologies was used in conjunction withaerial photography for intelligence and bombing damage assessmentpurposes (among others). However, the extent of the use of imageanalysis (particularly image analysis of remotely-sensed images),particularly for identifying or locating targets of interest, has alwaysbeen limited by the need for highly-trained, specialized image analystsor interpreters. The need for specialized (and expensive) skills haslimited the use of image analysis to a correspondingly limited range ofapplications (notably military, homeland defense, and law enforcement).

The market for image analysis has also historically been limited by thehigh cost of obtaining images to analyze. In the military arena, thebenefits were sufficiently apparent that large numbers of militaryreconnaissance flights were made over regions of interest since WorldWar 2. But the cost of such flights virtually totally excluded allcommercial applications of image analysis. Starting in the 1970s withthe Landsat satellite, this began to change as low resolution satelliteimages became publicly available. A series of new satellites has openedup progressively more applications as the resolution, spectral coverage,geographic coverage, and cost per image have all continuously improved;accordingly, a significant market in commercial remote sensing imageryhas emerged. But even this market has been limited from achieving itsfull potential because of the still-present requirement for expensive,scarce image analysis talent. Some progress has been made in automatedimage analysis technologies, but for a vast range of current andpotential applications, large scale image analysis (such as would beneeded when analyzing satellite images of a large region) remains tooexpensive and too supply-constrained to use.

One common type of image analysis problem is the “search and locate”problem. In this problem, what is needed is to find and to preciselylocate one or more targets of interest. For example, in search andrescue, it may be important to find a missing plane using satelliteimagery. Another example is the finding and precise location ofwarships, tanks, or other military targets of interest. Less common butpromising applications include such things as assessing hurricane damageby finding and locating damaged buildings and infrastructure, findingand locating potentially important archeological sites (for instance, byidentifying possible ruins in deserts), and assessing the scope of arefugee problem by for example counting tents in an area of interest.

Recently, the notion of “crowdsourcing” (using very large numbers ofpeople, each doing a small part of a large task, to accomplish large ofcomplex tasks quickly at extremely low cost) has emerged, and a numberof crowdsourcing platforms have been implemented. Some of these addresstopics of broad general interest (for example, WIKIPEDIA™), and some aremore specialized (for example, GALAXYZOO™, where users are shown imagesof objects from the Hubble Space Telescope and asked to decide if theobject shown is a galaxy and, if so, what kind of galaxy it is). Mostcrowdsourcing platforms to date rely on volunteers to perform the work,although some (such as Amazon's Mechanical Turk) are commercial innature and pay for crowdsourced work. There have been two generalapproaches to managing crowdsourced work. In the first, a large, complexor repetitive task is broken up into many subtasks, with each subtaskbeing given to a single worker; as workers complete the subtasks, theresults are rolled up and the overall task is completed at low cost.Generally, various means are used to measure the quality or value of thetasks performed by each participant, so that over time a reputation orquality score can be assigned to each participant; in some cases, workis assigned based at least in part on these reputation or qualityscores. The work distribution and quality measurement approach is used,for example, by Amazon's Mechanical Turk platform. A second commonapproach to crowdsourcing is to use an essentially democratic process tohave a crowd decide a difficult question. The process is referred to as“democratic” because each participant simply votes on what theparticipants believes the answer to be (this is helpful forclassification problems such as that described above for GALAXYZOO™).

While aspects of both of these problems are relevant to the broad searchand locate application domain, neither of them is sufficient. Considerthe refugee assessment problem just described. The work distributionapproach can clearly be used to divide up the task for distribution tomany participants (typically volunteers). Similarly, the democraticapproach could be used by the platform to decide whether something is oris not a tent, based on the number of votes each classification of aspecific object received. But neither of these dominant approaches issatisfactory, and the two together are not satisfactory either, for thesearch and locate problem. It is not enough to divide and conquer,because in searching an image for a specific object considerableambiguity will be present, and if each image segment is only viewed by asingle person, there would be a high likelihood of missed targets (andindeed of false positives). If multiple participants are shown the sameimage and a vote is taken to decide if a target of interest is present,the outcome is better. but even in this case there are problems.Consider again the refugee problem—if there are in fact ten tents in agiven field of view (image segment), various participants might reportanywhere from three to twelve tents in the segment. A simple average ofthese counts could be taken, but would likely be inaccurate. But the“search and locate” problem also requires that the location of each tentbe identified (at least implicitly—it is not so important in thisparticular problem that the exact location of each tent is known, but itis important to use locations to resolve count ambiguities; in mostsearch and locate problems, though, the location aspect is a keyoutput).

What is needed, is a system and method to allow to aggregate and trackover time movement, locations and participation in both virtual and realworld groups and associations, as well as obtaining a sentiment readingby grouping social media and other communication content into categoriesand visualizing these in geographical terms.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, the inventor has conceived, and reduced to practice, in apreferred embodiment of the invention, a platform for crowdsourcing theanalysis of images, and particularly for analysis of aerial or satelliteimages to geolocate one or more targets of interest, or to identifyobjects or their types.

According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, a system formovement intelligence using satellite imagery, comprising a geospatialdata analytics platform module comprising at least a plurality ofsoftware programming instructions stored in a memory and operating on aprocessor of a computing device, configured to operate a plurality ofinternal processing software modules, the internal processing softwaremodules comprising at least one of each of: an analytics moduleconfigured to receive at least raster data from a plurality of datasources, and configured to analyze at least a portion of the raster andvector data to identify movement patterns in the data; an internalservices module configured to handle data processing to and from aplurality of internally-maintained data sources; and an externalservices module configured to handle data processing to and from aplurality of external data sources, is disclosed.

According to another preferred embodiment of the invention, a method formovement intelligence using satellite imagery, comprising the steps ofapplying, using an analytics module configured to receive at leastraster data from a plurality of data sources, and configured to analyzeat least a portion of the raster and vector data to identify movementpatterns in the data, a Gaussian distribution error model to a pluralityof raster and vector data; computing travel frequency in raster datafrom the Gaussian error model; vectorizing high-density travel regions;and fusing the raster and vector data to produce an estimation for roadconflation, is disclosed.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings illustrate several embodiments of theinvention and, together with the description, serve to explain theprinciples of the invention according to the embodiments. One skilled inthe art will recognize that the particular embodiments illustrated inthe drawings are merely exemplary, and are not intended to limit thescope of the present invention.

FIG. 1 shows an exemplary overview of geospatial data analytics platform(GDAP) architecture, according to a preferred embodiment of the systemand method disclosed herein.

FIG. 2 shows an exemplary view of enhanced GDAP system architecture,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein.

FIG. 3 shows an exemplary view of enhanced system architecture,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein, wherein the GDAP external services has a mobile device servicethat enables a user of mobile device to run a viewer module, withsimilar functionality to a full display version of the viewer for adesktop computer, but with a simplified interface.

FIG. 4 shows an exemplary view of a vector data flow system, accordingto a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosed herein,where the different vector data are processed in modules and motion dataare processed in modules.

FIG. 5 shows an exemplary view of a red/green terrain analysis system,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein, for data flow.

FIG. 6 shows a more global overview of the system architecture,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein.

FIG. 7 shows a satellite image, containing a set of tracks, points ofinterest (red dots with black centers and black outlines), as well as atool bar with system management tools such as, for example, zoom in,zoom out, GPS coordinates, geographic identifiers such as town name, orother operational tags.

FIG. 8 shows tracks overlaid on a satellite image.

FIG. 9A shows an object entering a satellite image on a track.

FIG. 9B shows a shaded circle on a satellite image indicating where atracked object disappeared.

FIG. 10 shows an exemplary overview of a map area with a matchingsatellite image.

FIG. 11 shows an exemplary approach used to perform choke pointanalysis, according to an embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein.

FIG. 12 shows an exemplary diagram of an annotated satellite image of atown, in this case Fredericksburg, W. Va., according to an embodiment ofthe system and method disclosed herein.

FIG. 13 shows an overview of an exemplary program screen, according toan embodiment of the system and method disclosed herein.

FIG. 14 shows an exemplary set of screens for a track conflation modelfor travel congestion and geometry extraction with no road geometry ortrack error, according to an embodiment of the system and methoddisclosed herein.

FIG. 15 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary hardwarearchitecture of a computing device used in an embodiment of theinvention.

FIG. 16 is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary logicalarchitecture for a client device, according to an embodiment of theinvention.

FIG. 17 is a block diagram showing an exemplary architecturalarrangement of clients, servers, and external services, according to anembodiment of the invention.

FIG. 18 is another block diagram illustrating an exemplary hardwarearchitecture of a computing device used in various embodiments of theinvention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The inventor has conceived, and reduced to practice, in a preferredembodiment of the invention, a platform for crowdsourcing the analysisof images, and particularly for analysis of aerial or satellite imagesto geolocate one or more targets of interest, or to identify objects ortheir types.

One or more different inventions may be described in the presentapplication. Further, for one or more of the inventions describedherein, numerous alternative embodiments may be described; it should beappreciated that these are presented for illustrative purposes only andare not limiting of the inventions contained herein or the claimspresented herein in any way. One or more of the inventions may be widelyapplicable to numerous embodiments, as may be readily apparent from thedisclosure. In general, embodiments are described in sufficient detailto enable those skilled in the art to practice one or more of theinventions, and it should be appreciated that other embodiments may beutilized and that structural, logical, software, electrical and otherchanges may be made without departing from the scope of the particularinventions. Accordingly, one skilled in the art will recognize that oneor more of the inventions may be practiced with various modificationsand alterations. Particular features of one or more of the inventionsdescribed herein may be described with reference to one or moreparticular embodiments or figures that form a part of the presentdisclosure, and in which are shown, by way of illustration, specificembodiments of one or more of the inventions. It should be appreciated,however, that such features are not limited to usage in the one or moreparticular embodiments or figures with reference to which they aredescribed. The present disclosure is neither a literal description ofall embodiments of one or more of the inventions nor a listing offeatures of one or more of the inventions that must be present in allembodiments.

Headings of sections provided in this patent application and the titleof this patent application are for convenience only, and are not to betaken as limiting the disclosure in any way.

Devices that are in communication with each other need not be incontinuous communication with each other, unless expressly specifiedotherwise. In addition, devices that are in communication with eachother may communicate directly or indirectly through one or morecommunication means or intermediaries, logical or physical.

A description of an embodiment with several components in communicationwith each other does not imply that all such components are required. Tothe contrary, a variety of optional components may be described toillustrate a wide variety of possible embodiments of one or more of theinventions and in order to more fully illustrate one or more aspects ofthe inventions. Similarly, although process steps, method steps,algorithms or the like may be described in a sequential order, suchprocesses, methods and algorithms may generally be configured to work inalternate orders, unless specifically stated to the contrary. In otherwords, any sequence or order of steps that may be described in thispatent application does not, in and of itself, indicate a requirementthat the steps be performed in that order. The steps of describedprocesses may be performed in any order practical. Further, some stepsmay be performed simultaneously despite being described or implied asoccurring non-simultaneously (e.g., because one step is described afterthe other step). Moreover, the illustration of a process by itsdepiction in a drawing does not imply that the illustrated process isexclusive of other variations and modifications thereto, does not implythat the illustrated process or any of its steps are necessary to one ormore of the invention(s), and does not imply that the illustratedprocess is preferred. Also, steps are generally described once perembodiment, but this does not mean they must occur once, or that theymay only occur once each time a process, method, or algorithm is carriedout or executed. Some steps may be omitted in some embodiments or someoccurrences, or some steps may be executed more than once in a givenembodiment or occurrence.

When a single device or article is described herein, it will be readilyapparent that more than one device or article may be used in place of asingle device or article. Similarly, where more than one device orarticle is described herein, it will be readily apparent that a singledevice or article may be used in place of the more than one device orarticle.

The functionality or the features of a device may be alternativelyembodied by one or more other devices that are not explicitly describedas having such functionality or features. Thus, other embodiments of oneor more of the inventions need not include the device itself.

Techniques and mechanisms described or referenced herein will sometimesbe described in singular form for clarity. However, it should beappreciated that particular embodiments may include multiple iterationsof a technique or multiple instantiations of a mechanism unless notedotherwise. Process descriptions or blocks in figures should beunderstood as representing modules, segments, or portions of code whichinclude one or more executable instructions for implementing specificlogical functions or steps in the process. Alternate implementations areincluded within the scope of embodiments of the present invention inwhich, for example, functions may be executed out of order from thatshown or discussed, including substantially concurrently or in reverseorder, depending on the functionality involved, as would be understoodby those having ordinary skill in the art.

Conceptual Architecture

The embodiments disclosed herein enable incorporation of geographicaldata into a map-related system, adding tracked objects within a specificarea and analyzing their type of movement. The system may track objectsvisually from a tracking means in the sky, such as a drone, a satellite,a blimp, a high-altitude aircraft, or other, similar vehicle, usingeither high-resolution or infra-red video. Furthermore, the system canthen analyze characteristics of the tracked object(s), such as speed andmotion, to determine the nature of the objects, such as, for example,whether a car, a train, a motor bike, a motorcycle, a bicycle, or apedestrian, or in some cases other types of movable objects such asdrones, UAVs, robots, boats and other forms of movable objects.

For example, the system can have features to support complex queries oftracking and tracking event data for complicated, composite events. Itcan help find tracks by event, by time within the area of interest(AOI), near a point of interest (POI), or relative to features. Also,tracking may be done by GPS or other mobile device techniques, includingbut not limited to tower or beacon triangulation, inertia navigation,radio compass or any other suitable method.

The system further enables discovery of tracked movement in relation toan area. It can highlight where a track started or where a track went;and what other tracks started or arrived at the same location. Once anobject has been identified, the system can create a trail or track thatin this context shall mean a trail or track that shows the actualmovement of the object of interest. Also if the track suddenly stops ordisappears, an “area of evasion” can be determined to show that theobject has disappeared or has evaded the tracking means. For example, anobject may disappear by blocking the antenna of the GPS tracking deviceor by melting into the background and being impossible to trackvisually. The trail or track may change its appearance to indicateadditional information. Such changes could include, for example,variations in color, hatching or dash patterns, width, etc. as well aslayering, wherein only certain trails of interest are on a visible layerto unclutter the view. Additional information may include, for example,proximity to AOI, person, or object identifier, speed at which the itemis moving, etc.

The system and method disclosed herein may be used, for example, fortransit time analysis based on real time or historic traffic flows.While such tracking and analysis is similar to what is currently donein, for example, Google maps, it can be done by using visual meansadditionally, or in lieu of the typical mobile device tracking. Thisapproach also enables choke point analysis, where there is a highconcentration of traffic, and it enables further research into details.

FIG. 1 shows an exemplary overview of geospatial data analytics platform(GDAP) architecture 100, according to a preferred embodiment of thesystem and method disclosed herein. GDAP, which is a geospatial big dataplatform with vector and raster analytics, can combine vector and rasterdata into one tool set on one platform, so users can examine and runanalytics on all the data, without having to procure the data beforeeach analytic session. GDAP module 112 contains various internalmodules, plus access to vector database 117 and raster database 119.Analytics module 118 can combine the two databases. Other modulesinclude an external services module 113 and an internal services module114 to manage internal data processing. Raster catalog 115 showsavailable raster data, such as, typically, aerial or satellite images,in database 119. Database 120, which could be an SQL database or anyother, similar type of database, contains motion intelligence data asdiscussed above and throughout. Module 112 can interface with viewermodule 101, which contains various analytic widgets, includingpredictive analytics widget 102; elevation data management (EDM)analytics widgets 103, offering vector watershed analysis and terrainmaps; GDAP analytics widget 104; and motion analytics widget 105,discussed earlier and throughout. All the tools and functions of modules101 and 112 can be integrated with EDM service 109. Additionally,external map service 106 includes general maps and other foundation data107 from various external sources.

FIG. 2 shows an exemplary view of enhanced GDAP system architecture 200,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein. GPU cluster 207 supports external services. Cluster 207 alsodoes elevation data analytics 209 and holds the motion event tracksdatabase 211, as discussed previously and throughout. Enhanced GDAPinternal data services 213 is supported by a new Hadoop clusterdedicated to managing all the databases inside the Hadoop HDFS system,including the data for the terrain analytics system 217, motionanalytics system 218, and pyramid surfaces factors elevation dataanalytics results of other processes. All internal data services may beconcentrated in Hadoop cluster 215 and managed by JBOSS 216, whichinterfaces with GDAP internal MIDAS services 213 and GDAP externalservices 212. Module 212 interfaces with enhanced viewer system 201 inwhich widgets 202, 203, 204, and 205 are all available for a user, asdiscussed above in the description of module 101 in FIG. 1. The toolsystem of module 201 can also interface with external map data servicesand foundation data 222, as well as user authentication module 221. Keydata is stored in separate secure storage area 220 that uses a scalabledistributed key/value storage system such as ACCUMULO™ to store the datawith cell-level encryption.

FIG. 3 shows an exemplary view of enhanced system architecture 300,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein, wherein the GDAP external services 312 has a mobile deviceservice that enables a user of mobile device 306 to run a viewer module301, with similar functionality to a full display version of the viewerfor a desktop computer, but with a simplified interface. In some cases,an internal user running the viewing software of module 301 would beable to send a preconfigured profile to a mobile device user so themobile device user doesn't have to go through the usual configurationsteps to view some data, which he may need urgently. In other cases, thedevice user may assemble a profile or modify an existing profile to suithis current, specific needs. This approach offers a single view for allthe data aggregated and combined from all the various sources acrosstime and geography.

FIG. 4 shows an exemplary view of a vector data flow system 400,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein, where the different vector data are processed in a plurality ofvector modules 401 and motion data are processed in a plurality ofmotion modules 402. They then flow through a plurality of preprocessingstages 403, into graphing module 404. Graphing module 404 then uses RESTinterface 405 to deliver routing information 406 and mobilityinformation 407, where it can be called up with a JSON output path 408to show a variety of routes 409, based, for example, on trafficcongestion and real-time data.

FIG. 5 shows an exemplary view of a red/green terrain analysis system500, according to a preferred embodiment of the system and methoddisclosed herein, for data flow. In this example, and typically, redindicates “unfriendly,” i.e., enemy-held, terrain, while green indicates“friendly” terrain. In other cases, other colors may be used to indicatedefined characteristics. Map data input modules 501 and motion datamodules 502 are processed into the graphing module 504, but in parallelsteps preprocessing modules 503 bring in metadata into the mainprocessing through the REST interface 505 and the OGC services 506. Thisapproach enables separation of the data into red/green terrain andoffers the results in different resolutions 507, as well as routing 508,with the option of fastest route, shortcut route, and no-go area routing509.

FIG. 6 shows a more global overview 600 of the system architecture,according to a preferred embodiment of the system and method disclosedherein. Source 601 is processed into database 602, while source 605 goesdirectly into cloud-based analytics 606. Using cloud-based analytics 606the results are pulled up in real time and delivered into the differentusage cases for different types of viewing 607 a-n and then topresentations 608 a-n.

FIG. 7 shows satellite image 700, containing a set of tracks 702 a-n,points of interest (red dots with black centers and black outlines) 701a-n, as well as a tool bar 704 that may display a variety of systemmanagement tools such as (for example, including but not limited to)zoom in, zoom out, GPS coordinates, geographic identifiers such as townname, or other operational tags. Toolbar 704 has a pen tool so a usercan highlight and mark an area. Window 703 may display additionalinformation about a selected area 705. Thus a user can execute variousoperations, such as, for example, combining the beginning and the end oftwo connected tracks.

FIG. 8 shows tracks 802 a-n overlaid on satellite image 800. Tracks 802a-n may pass by certain areas of interest (circles on screen display)that may be indicated by arrows 801 a-n. Also shown are toolbar 803 andinformation window 804 pertaining to a selected area 805, each of whichis described above with reference to FIG. 7.

FIG. 9A shows an object 905 entering satellite image 900 on track 901.In addition to the track, there could be (for example) color, width,dashed-line, or other visual styling or indications of a trail or changeof color to indicate the speed at which the object is traveling. Thetracked object 905 may be moving toward an area of interest 904. Alsoshown are toolbar 903 and information window 902, again as describedpreviously with reference to FIG. 7.

In FIG. 9B a circle 951 or other shape on satellite image 950 mayindicate a selected region where a tracked object disappeared. Othernearby objects of interest may be shown such as, for example, a buildingwith parking lot 952, as indicated by a shaded square. Also shown aretoolbar 953 and information window 954, again as described previouslywith reference to FIG. 7.

FIG. 10 shows an exemplary overview of a map area 1003 with a matchingsatellite image 1000. Inset into map 1003 is a detailed section 1004,which roughly represents the area of satellite image 1000. Overlaid onimage 1000 is a control window 1001, which contains slider 1005. Thisslider may be used to enable a user to display changes in traffic flowaccording to (for example) the time of day or the week, or othercriteria. Additional interactive control elements may be presented inwindow 1001 to enable a user to select the day of the week and otheroperations, or to provide specific controls for features such asholidays.

FIG. 11 shows an exemplary approach used to perform choke pointanalysis, according to an exemplary embodiment of the system and methoddisclosed herein. Choke points typically occur when several trafficroutes end up in an area with lots of points of interest, such as, forexample, restaurants, bars, theaters, sports arena, etc. By mappingmajor traffic flows 1101 a and 1101 b, choke points 1102 a-n and pointsof interest 1103 a-n on satellite image 1100, it becomes apparent thataround those POIs there are, on a regular basis, traffic jams. Chokepoint mapping according to the embodiment may be used to help managetraffic better or for security purposes.

FIG. 12 shows an exemplary diagram of an annotated satellite image 1200of a town, in this case Fredericksburg, Va., according to an exemplaryembodiment of the system and method disclosed herein. Data tracks may beshown and color-coded with distinctions made according to tracked speedand other factors. Accordingly, motor vehicle tracks may (for example)be shown in blue while pedestrian tracks, determined by speed,randomness of movement, and departure from roads, may be shown in red.Further according to this example, tracks of other unknown,uncategorized vehicles, such as, for example, bicycles, motorcycles,etc., may be shown in yellow. This exemplary figure is presented simplyfor the purpose of illustrating how such data may be presented to a uservisually.

FIG. 13 shows an overview of an exemplary program screen 1300, accordingto an exemplary embodiment of the system and method disclosed herein. Atool window 1301 has been folded out from toolbox 1305. In window 1301 aslider 1304 can be used to present and interact with visualizations oftraffic flow in a selected area 1303 of a map or satellite image view1310, which may be shown in an additional zoomed-in view box 1302 ifdesired.

FIG. 14 shows an exemplary set of screens 1400 for a track conflationmodel for travel congestion and geometry extraction with no roadgeometry or track error, according to an exemplary embodiment of thesystem and method disclosed herein. Using an algorithm to resample thetracks gives the following results: In screen A 1410, the system hasapplied an error model with Gaussian distribution orthonormal to trackpoints. In screen B 1420, the density of the rasterized model estimatestravel frequency. Screen C 1430 shows the highest density regionsvectorized. In screen D 1440, a fused version of the model produces anestimation for the road framework and the road segment geometry returnedwith intersection removal is applied.

In some cases, the system may collect data about tracked persons (TPs),with the data derived from a visualizing analytic software tool runningon a computer. In such cases, the collected data may enable agents totrack multiple TPs in space and over time, so that associations withother TPs may be detected. The same system, may in certain cases,collect data about the movement of TPs in and around certain locations.Further, these visualization tools may enable agents to discoverconnections between members of different online social networks. Allthese abilities enable the system to infer causality of actions from ananalysis of chronology of events. Additionally, a subset of thecollected data may be delivered in a suitable format to mobile devicesin the field in near real time. In other cases, the system may discern afrequent location of a TP and therefore be able to associate thatlocation with a non-trackable person who is known to have real-worldassociation with the TP. Also, the system may parse the content ofavailable posts of social media for purposes of obtaining a picture ofprevalent languages, sentiments and events of interest. The system maythen in some cases map the density of such prevalent items of intereston a small urban level to identify allegiances in certain areas.

In some cases, the system may incorporate geographical data into amap-related system, adding tracked objects within a specific area andanalyzing their type of movement. The system may track objects visuallyfrom a tracking means in the sky, such as a drone, a satellite, a blimp,a high-altitude aircraft, or other, similar vehicle, using eitherhigh-resolution or infra-red video. It may also track objects using GPS,tower triangulation, beacon triangulation, inertia navigation or radiocompass. Furthermore, the system can then analyze characteristics of thetracked object(s), such as speed and motion, to determine the nature ofthe objects, such as, for example, whether a car, a train, a motor bike,a motorcycle, a bicycle, or a pedestrian. Additionally, the systemsupports queries concerning tracks with relationship to single ormultiple events, times, areas and points of interest, and features.

Hardware Architecture

Generally, the techniques disclosed herein may be implemented onhardware or a combination of software and hardware. For example, theymay be implemented in an operating system kernel, in a separate userprocess, in a library package bound into network applications, on aspecially constructed machine, on an application-specific integratedcircuit (ASIC), or on a network interface card.

Software/hardware hybrid implementations of at least some of theembodiments disclosed herein may be implemented on a programmablenetwork-resident machine (which should be understood to includeintermittently connected network-aware machines) selectively activatedor reconfigured by a computer program stored in memory. Such networkdevices may have multiple network interfaces that may be configured ordesigned to utilize different types of network communication protocols.A general architecture for some of these machines may be describedherein in order to illustrate one or more exemplary means by which agiven unit of functionality may be implemented. According to specificembodiments, at least some of the features or functionalities of thevarious embodiments disclosed herein may be implemented on one or moregeneral-purpose computers associated with one or more networks, such asfor example an end-user computer system, a client computer, a networkserver or other server system, a mobile computing device (e.g., tabletcomputing device, mobile phone, smartphone, laptop, or other appropriatecomputing device), a consumer electronic device, a music player, or anyother suitable electronic device, router, switch, or other suitabledevice, or any combination thereof. In at least some embodiments, atleast some of the features or functionalities of the various embodimentsdisclosed herein may be implemented in one or more virtualized computingenvironments (e.g., network computing clouds, virtual machines hosted onone or more physical computing machines, or other appropriate virtualenvironments).

Referring now to FIG. 15, there is shown a block diagram depicting anexemplary computing device 10 suitable for implementing at least aportion of the features or functionalities disclosed herein. Computingdevice 10 may be, for example, any one of the computing machines listedin the previous paragraph, or indeed any other electronic device capableof executing software- or hardware-based instructions according to oneor more programs stored in memory. Computing device 10 may be configuredto communicate with a plurality of other computing devices, such asclients or servers, over communications networks such as a wide areanetwork a metropolitan area network, a local area network, a wirelessnetwork, the Internet, or any other network, using known protocols forsuch communication, whether wireless or wired.

In one embodiment, computing device 10 includes one or more centralprocessing units (CPU) 12, one or more interfaces 15, and one or morebusses 14 (such as a peripheral component interconnect (PCI) bus). Whenacting under the control of appropriate software or firmware, CPU 12 maybe responsible for implementing specific functions associated with thefunctions of a specifically configured computing device or machine. Forexample, in at least one embodiment, a computing device 10 may beconfigured or designed to function as a server system utilizing CPU 12,local memory 11 and/or remote memory 16, and interface(s) 15. In atleast one embodiment, CPU 12 may be caused to perform one or more of thedifferent types of functions and/or operations under the control ofsoftware modules or components, which for example, may include anoperating system and any appropriate applications software, drivers, andthe like.

CPU 12 may include one or more processors 13 such as, for example, aprocessor from one of the Intel, ARM, Qualcomm, and AMD families ofmicroprocessors. In some embodiments, processors 13 may includespecially designed hardware such as application-specific integratedcircuits (ASICs), electrically erasable programmable read-only memories(EEPROMs), field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), and so forth, forcontrolling operations of computing device 10. In a specific embodiment,a local memory 11 (such as non-volatile random access memory (RAM)and/or read-only memory (ROM), including for example one or more levelsof cached memory) may also form part of CPU 12. However, there are manydifferent ways in which memory may be coupled to system 10. Memory 11may be used for a variety of purposes such as, for example, cachingand/or storing data, programming instructions, and the like. It shouldbe further appreciated that CPU 12 may be one of a variety ofsystem-on-a-chip (SOC) type hardware that may include additionalhardware such as memory or graphics processing chips, such as a QUALCOMMSNAPDRAGON™ or SAMSUNG EXYNOS™ CPU as are becoming increasingly commonin the art, such as for use in mobile devices or integrated devices.

As used herein, the term “processor” is not limited merely to thoseintegrated circuits referred to in the art as a processor, a mobileprocessor, or a microprocessor, but broadly refers to a microcontroller,a microcomputer, a programmable logic controller, anapplication-specific integrated circuit, and any other programmablecircuit.

In one embodiment, interfaces 15 are provided as network interface cards(NICs). Generally, NICs control the sending and receiving of datapackets over a computer network; other types of interfaces 15 may forexample support other peripherals used with computing device 10. Amongthe interfaces that may be provided are Ethernet interfaces, frame relayinterfaces, cable interfaces, DSL interfaces, token ring interfaces,graphics interfaces, and the like. In addition, various types ofinterfaces may be provided such as, for example, universal serial bus(USB), Serial, Ethernet, FIREWIRE™, THUNDERBOLT™, PCI, parallel, radiofrequency (RF), BLUETOOTH™, near-field communications (e.g., usingnear-field magnetics), 802.11 (WiFi), frame relay, TCP/IP, ISDN, fastEthernet interfaces, Gigabit Ethernet interfaces, Serial ATA (SATA) orexternal SATA (ESATA) interfaces, high-definition multimedia interface(HDMI), digital visual interface (DVI), analog or digital audiointerfaces, asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) interfaces, high-speedserial interface (HSSI) interfaces, Point of Sale (POS) interfaces,fiber data distributed interfaces (FDDIs), and the like. Generally, suchinterfaces 15 may include physical ports appropriate for communicationwith appropriate media. In some cases, they may also include anindependent processor (such as a dedicated audio or video processor, asis common in the art for high-fidelity AN hardware interfaces) and, insome instances, volatile and/or non-volatile memory (e.g., RAM).

Although the system shown in FIG. 15 illustrates one specificarchitecture for a computing device 10 for implementing one or more ofthe inventions described herein, it is by no means the only devicearchitecture on which at least a portion of the features and techniquesdescribed herein may be implemented. For example, architectures havingone or any number of processors 13 may be used, and such processors 13may be present in a single device or distributed among any number ofdevices. In one embodiment, a single processor 13 handles communicationsas well as routing computations, while in other embodiments a separatededicated communications processor may be provided. In variousembodiments, different types of features or functionalities may beimplemented in a system according to the invention that includes aclient device (such as a tablet device or smartphone running clientsoftware) and server systems (such as a server system described in moredetail below).

Regardless of network device configuration, the system of the presentinvention may employ one or more memories or memory modules (such as,for example, remote memory block 16 and local memory 11) configured tostore data, program instructions for the general-purpose networkoperations, or other information relating to the functionality of theembodiments described herein (or any combinations of the above). Programinstructions may control execution of or comprise an operating systemand/or one or more applications, for example. Memory 16 or memories 11,16 may also be configured to store data structures, configuration data,encryption data, historical system operations information, or any otherspecific or generic non-program information described herein.

Because such information and program instructions may be employed toimplement one or more systems or methods described herein, at least somenetwork device embodiments may include nontransitory machine-readablestorage media, which, for example, may be configured or designed tostore program instructions, state information, and the like forperforming various operations described herein. Examples of suchnontransitory machine-readable storage media include, but are notlimited to, magnetic media such as hard disks, floppy disks, andmagnetic tape; optical media such as CD-ROM disks; magneto-optical mediasuch as optical disks, and hardware devices that are speciallyconfigured to store and perform program instructions, such as read-onlymemory devices (ROM), flash memory (as is common in mobile devices andintegrated systems), solid state drives (SSD) and “hybrid SSD” storagedrives that may combine physical components of solid state and hard diskdrives in a single hardware device (as are becoming increasingly commonin the art with regard to personal computers), memristor memory, randomaccess memory (RAM), and the like. It should be appreciated that suchstorage means may be integral and non-removable (such as RAM hardwaremodules that may be soldered onto a motherboard or otherwise integratedinto an electronic device), or they may be removable such as swappableflash memory modules (such as “thumb drives” or other removable mediadesigned for rapidly exchanging physical storage devices),“hot-swappable” hard disk drives or solid state drives, removableoptical storage discs, or other such removable media, and that suchintegral and removable storage media may be utilized interchangeably.Examples of program instructions include both object code, such as maybe produced by a compiler, machine code, such as may be produced by anassembler or a linker, byte code, such as may be generated by forexample a JAVA™ compiler and may be executed using a Java virtualmachine or equivalent, or files containing higher level code that may beexecuted by the computer using an interpreter (for example, scriptswritten in Python, Perl, Ruby, Groovy, or any other scripting language).

In some embodiments, systems according to the present invention may beimplemented on a standalone computing system. Referring now to FIG. 16,there is shown a block diagram depicting a typical exemplaryarchitecture of one or more embodiments or components thereof on astandalone computing system. Computing device 20 includes processors 21that may run software that carry out one or more functions orapplications of embodiments of the invention, such as for example aclient application 24. Processors 21 may carry out computinginstructions under control of an operating system 22 such as, forexample, a version of MICROSOFT WINDOWS™ operating system, APPLE OSX™ oriOS™ operating systems, some variety of the Linux operating system,ANDROID™ operating system, or the like. In many cases, one or moreshared services 23 may be operable in system 20, and may be useful forproviding common services to client applications 24. Services 23 may forexample be WINDOWS™ services, user-space common services in a Linuxenvironment, or any other type of common service architecture used withoperating system 21. Input devices 28 may be of any type suitable forreceiving user input, including for example a keyboard, touchscreen,microphone (for example, for voice input), mouse, touchpad, trackball,or any combination thereof. Output devices 27 may be of any typesuitable for providing output to one or more users, whether remote orlocal to system 20, and may include for example one or more screens forvisual output, speakers, printers, or any combination thereof. Memory 25may be random-access memory having any structure and architecture knownin the art, for use by processors 21, for example to run software.Storage devices 26 may be any magnetic, optical, mechanical, memristor,or electrical storage device for storage of data in digital form (suchas those described above, referring to FIG. 15). Examples of storagedevices 26 include flash memory, magnetic hard drive, CD-ROM, and/or thelike.

In some embodiments, systems of the present invention may be implementedon a distributed computing network, such as one having any number ofclients and/or servers. Referring now to FIG. 17, there is shown a blockdiagram depicting an exemplary architecture 30 for implementing at leasta portion of a system according to an embodiment of the invention on adistributed computing network. According to the embodiment, any numberof clients 33 may be provided. Each client 33 may run software forimplementing client-side portions of the present invention; clients maycomprise a system 20 such as that illustrated in FIG. 16. In addition,any number of servers 32 may be provided for handling requests receivedfrom one or more clients 33. Clients 33 and servers 32 may communicatewith one another via one or more electronic networks 31, which may be invarious embodiments any of the Internet, a wide area network, a mobiletelephony network (such as CDMA or GSM cellular networks), a wirelessnetwork (such as WiFi, WiMAX, LTE, and so forth), or a local areanetwork (or indeed any network topology known in the art; the inventiondoes not prefer any one network topology over any other). Networks 31may be implemented using any known network protocols, including forexample wired and/or wireless protocols.

In addition, in some embodiments, servers 32 may call external services37 when needed to obtain additional information, or to refer toadditional data concerning a particular call. Communications withexternal services 37 may take place, for example, via one or morenetworks 31. In various embodiments, external services 37 may compriseweb-enabled services or functionality related to or installed on thehardware device itself. For example, in an embodiment where clientapplications 24 are implemented on a smartphone or other electronicdevice, client applications 24 may obtain information stored in a serversystem 32 in the cloud or on an external service 37 deployed on one ormore of a particular enterprise's or user's premises.

In some embodiments of the invention, clients 33 or servers 32 (or both)may make use of one or more specialized services or appliances that maybe deployed locally or remotely across one or more networks 31. Forexample, one or more databases 34 may be used or referred to by one ormore embodiments of the invention. It should be understood by one havingordinary skill in the art that databases 34 may be arranged in a widevariety of architectures and using a wide variety of data access andmanipulation means. For example, in various embodiments one or moredatabases 34 may comprise a relational database system using astructured query language (SQL), while others may comprise analternative data storage technology such as those referred to in the artas “NoSQL” (for example, HADOOP CASSANDRA™, GOOGLE BIGTABLE™, and soforth). In some embodiments, variant database architectures such ascolumn-oriented databases, in-memory databases, clustered databases,distributed databases, or even flat file data repositories may be usedaccording to the invention. It will be appreciated by one havingordinary skill in the art that any combination of known or futuredatabase technologies may be used as appropriate, unless a specificdatabase technology or a specific arrangement of components is specifiedfor a particular embodiment herein. Moreover, it should be appreciatedthat the term “database” as used herein may refer to a physical databasemachine, a cluster of machines acting as a single database system, or alogical database within an overall database management system. Unless aspecific meaning is specified for a given use of the term “database”, itshould be construed to mean any of these senses of the word, all ofwhich are understood as a plain meaning of the term “database” by thosehaving ordinary skill in the art.

Similarly, most embodiments of the invention may make use of one or moresecurity systems 36 and configuration systems 35. Security andconfiguration management are common information technology (IT) and webfunctions, and some amount of each are generally associated with any ITor web systems. It should be understood by one having ordinary skill inthe art that any configuration or security subsystems known in the artnow or in the future may be used in conjunction with embodiments of theinvention without limitation, unless a specific security 36 orconfiguration system 35 or approach is specifically required by thedescription of any specific embodiment.

FIG. 18 shows an exemplary overview of a computer system 40 as may beused in any of the various locations throughout the system. It isexemplary of any computer that may execute code to process data. Variousmodifications and changes may be made to computer system 40 withoutdeparting from the broader scope of the system and method disclosedherein. Central processor unit (CPU) 41 is connected to bus 42, to whichbus is also connected memory 43, nonvolatile memory 44, display 47,input/output (I/O) unit 48, and network interface card (NIC) 53. I/Ounit 48 may, typically, be connected to keyboard 49, pointing device 50,hard disk 52, and real-time clock 51. NIC 53 connects to network 54,which may be the Internet or a local network, which local network may ormay not have connections to the Internet. Also shown as part of system40 is power supply unit 45 connected, in this example, to a mainalternating current (AC) supply 46. Not shown are batteries that couldbe present, and many other devices and modifications that are well knownbut are not applicable to the specific novel functions of the currentsystem and method disclosed herein. It should be appreciated that someor all components illustrated may be combined, such as in variousintegrated applications, for example Qualcomm or Samsungsystem-on-a-chip (SOC) devices, or whenever it may be appropriate tocombine multiple capabilities or functions into a single hardware device(for instance, in mobile devices such as smartphones, video gameconsoles, in-vehicle computer systems such as navigation or multimediasystems in automobiles, or other integrated hardware devices).

In various embodiments, functionality for implementing systems ormethods of the present invention may be distributed among any number ofclient and/or server components. For example, various software modulesmay be implemented for performing various functions in connection withthe present invention, and such modules may be variously implemented torun on server and/or client components.

The skilled person will be aware of a range of possible modifications ofthe various embodiments described above. Accordingly, the presentinvention is defined by the claims and their equivalents.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method for recognizing and characterizingmovement of objects on the Earth's surface using satellite imagery,comprising: receiving, at a geospatial analytics platform comprising aplurality of processors, a memory, and a plurality of programminginstructions stored in the memory and operating on at least one of theprocessors, at least a set of raster data from a satellite imagingsystem; determining movement of an object on the Earth, using at leastsome of the programming instructions and the raster data by computingdifferences in each of a plurality of still satellite images extractedfrom the raster data; generating a movement layer associated with aspecific satellite image of a region of interest on the Earth's surface;and displaying the specific satellite image with the movement layersuperimposed thereupon.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein raster data isreceived from a raster database.
 3. The method of claim 1, whereinraster data is received from a vector database.
 4. The method of claim1, wherein raster data is received from a third-party map service. 5.The method of claim 1, further comprising the step of identifying atracked object in the movement layer.
 6. The method of claim 5, whereinmovement patterns of the tracked object are further analyzed todetermine whether the tracked object is a vehicle.